


Weight of the World

by Duck_Life



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Possession, Alec Lightwood Deserves Nice Things, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Episode: s02e04 Day of Wrath
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-28
Updated: 2017-01-28
Packaged: 2018-09-20 09:48:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9485654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duck_Life/pseuds/Duck_Life
Summary: Magnus is Alec's rock.





	

It’s past midnight when there’s a knock on Magnus Bane’s door, which isn’t really that unusual for Magnus. It’s unusual for Alec, though, who frets at his fraying cuffs and then knocks a second time. He should be sleeping. He should be at the Institute. He should be looking after Lydia, or Isabelle, or any of the other people he’s hurt.

“Alexander,” Magnus greets him when he opens the door, and from the tone of his voice Alec knows that Magnus has heard all about the demon at the Institute.

Magnus holds out one decorated hand and lightly, lightly, touches Alec’s cheek. Alec holds his hand there like he can keep it there forever, tethered eternally to Magnus and his comforting voice and his kind eyes and his careful hands. They stand there for a long moment, like some glittery forgotten Renaissance painting, and then Alec bursts through the door.

“I killed Jocelyn,” he says all in a rush, hands raking through his hair. “I did it. I did it. I killed her.” Magnus watches him, an old familiar ache stinging his bones. He had his disagreements with Jocelyn Fairchild, but she was a good person, and now she’s gone. The good people always die, and the bad ones too, and he’s always left. “I killed her, Magnus.”

“No, you didn’t,” he says, gentle but firm. “You didn’t kill anyone. You didn’t _hurt_ anyone. It wasn’t you, Alec. I promise you.”

Alec looks like he’s about to say something but he just shakes his head, rattled, holds a hand to his mouth. “Do you… just… do you have any vodka?”

Magnus shakes his head and leads him toward the couch. “Not for you,” he says. “Not now.”

“ _Magnus_ ,” Alec starts, wanting to argue, wanting to fight, but Magnus holds out a hand and presses two sparking fingers to Alec’s forehead. First there’s nothing, and then he feels his body flood with warmth. His heartbeat steadies; the erratic energy flies away from his fingertips.

“You can talk to me,” Magnus says. “Or you can just sit here with me. Whatever you need.”

He’s too good. _Too good for you_ , Alec thinks to himself, _too good for a murderous traitorous monstrous_ – “It got me,” he chokes out, because maybe if he talks he can’t think at the same time. “The demon, it got me, got inside me. And then… and then…”

“Blackout,” Magnus supplies.

He nods. “Yeah,” he says. “At first. Yeah, when I first was… _me_ again, I didn’t remember anything. But later…”

Magnus is the brightest burning star Alec’s ever known, but his tragedies weigh heavy on him. Alec’s learned to spot the sadness, that old, old weight you can only carry if you’ve lived as long as Magnus. “Oh, Alec,” Magnus says.

“I remember it all,” Alec says. “Now. I remember… I always thought it would be like I was floating. Out of body. But…” He swallows. “I was _there_. I felt it all, felt my arms and legs move. I… Magnus, I tore through her like she was a sheet of paper.” Magnus’s magic can’t do everything, and Alec feels his heart start thumping too hard again, blood whooshing in his ears. “What did I do? What did I do?”

Magnus takes his hand and methodically sketches circles into Alec’s palm with the pad of his thumb. “It wasn’t your fault,” he says, but it sounds empty. “Possession happens to people, Alec, and even the most experienced Shadowhunters get taken down.”

He sighs, relaxes into Magnus’s side, but only a little. “It took Isabelle,” he says. “The demon… got her, used her. She attacked me.” Breaths shudder in and out of him like gusts of wind over a cold ocean. “I was ready. I was ready to let her kill me.”

Magnus just keeps rubbing little circles into Alec’s hand. Looking out he can see the balcony where, just hours ago, he confessed to Simon that he’d once tried to kill himself.

“You would have just put your sister in the same position you were in.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Alec snaps, too harshly, and then his face smooths over. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“Shh.” Magnus pulls him in close, letting Alec press his face into his neck. Jace held him like this, after everything. But also, Jace didn’t hold him like this at all. Jace held him like a brother, warm and familiar like the fireplace of a childhood home.

Magnus is comfortable without being ordinary, electrifying and enticing. Magnus holding him feels like the burn of whiskey, new and different but good, definitely good.

“I’m so scared,” Alec whispers, and he’s strong and stubborn but when he falls, he falls hard. His world’s been flipped around, his arms used like a puppet on a string. “What if… I could’ve hurt Clary. I could’ve hurt _Izzy_. What if it happens again?”

“It won’t.”

“How can you know that?”

Magnus shrugs, shifting so he can loop his arm more securely around his boyfriend’s shoulders. “I don’t,” he admits. “But I know what I need to believe to get me through the next minute. What _you_ need to believe.” His jaw clenches; his words sound hard to get out.

Alec watches him carefully. “Magnus—”

“I wish I could summon that demon here,” Magnus tells him suddenly, clouds storming in his eyes. “I could trap him, hurt him… I could…” His eyes flash and a few stray sparks fly off the end of his fingertips before he collects himself. “Alec, I want vengeance… but you need comfort. I’m sorry. I’m torn.”

“I don’t need you to be everything,” Alec tells him, sweet and sincere despite all he’s been through. “I just need you to be Magnus.”

“Well,” Magnus says. He wraps himself around Alec like a well-dressed octopus. “I’m very good at that.”


End file.
